The Modification of The Secret World: Top 10 The Secret World Mods #TSW13 comments

I am a big fan of mods. Always have been, probably always will be. Game Modifications allow you to take a game that you’re playing and alter the UI, in harmless ways, to better give you more information or make tedious tasks a little more bearable. As a rule of thumb, I tend to stay away from mods that I consider “cheating”, or generally take away the fun of the game. Also, I tend to stay away from mods of a system that the game is already doing well. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, sure, but an upgrade here or there doesn’t hurt.

The current game I’m stuck on, if you haven’t been able to tell, is The Secret World. A great MMO by Funcom that keeps getting better and better. And so, since I’m stuck on it, I thought I would extol and promote some of the best mods I have found. Some of them I use sporadically, and others I don’t know how I would play the game without. These mod creators are being more than generous, making and offering them for the community, so if you know of any mod makers out there, take a moment and say thanks for their efforts, or consider donating a few bucks their way if they make the option available.

Installing these mods is sort of a complicated process, so let me first describe how you would go about doing it.

First, download the mod you want, usually in ZIP file format, and open it using a standard program to do so. I use WinRAR, but feel free to use whatever works for you. Inside the ZIP will be a few folders and maybe some other files.

If there is a Readme text file, open that up and make sure there aren’t any more specific installation instructions.

Copy all the folders and files directly to your ‘The Secret World\Data\Gui\Customized’ folder, wherever you installed the game. I use Steam to open and play The Secret World, so, for example, the folder is located on my hard drive in the following location: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\The Secret World\Data\Gui\Customized.

So without further ado, here are my Top 10 The Secret World Game Modifications:

Once you get to the top levels of The Secret World, eeking out that little bit of extra damage in a new build is highly sought after, and there is no way better to do it than with a damage tracker. This one offers up the information without bothering anyone else, and works great.

For those of us who like story, but don’t like opening up the Mission log every step of the way, this mod works well. It alters the mission-tracker on the right side of the screen so that when you mouse-over the mission you’re on, it lists the text of the mission’s current tier.

I haven’t played with this one a lot, but I’ve found in group runs, especially in Scenarios, the stuff that drops that is a bother is almost excessive. However, we still need all of that stuff to disassemble to get materials from. This mod allows you to not have to have all of those green loot rolls taking up space on your screen. As you can see from the pic, I have it passing on all of those theatrics that we can’t sell, ignoring anything that has to do with Augments (by ignore, it means the roll window will still come up), and greeding any White-Green drops. If the drop doesn’t match any listed rule, it’ll default to the standard Need/Greed box. I’m sure I’l alter this to my needs as time goes on, but it’ll make getting loot a little less frustrating.

Resource HUD takes your weapon builder UI and places them to wherever you want them on the screen as well as makes them larger and more noticable. No more basic attacks when you’re ready for the bigger ones. I know the builders are already listed on-screen, but this makes them easier to see and react to.

Nametag Overload alters the tags above players and mobs heads to give you more information. You can customize it so that the healthbar changes colors as a mobs health falls and so that it gives a percentage of a bosses health left, as well as to always make it visible, even if the original nametag is off the screen. Very handy for dungeon and world bosses.

Now starts the four mods that, since I’ve been using them, I can’t play the game without. Valyrie’s Friends Enhanced alters the look of the Friend and Cabal list to make it more informative and customizable. Add information to any player, like preferred role or add a custom note as to how you met them, other characters they have, anything that would help you remember them better. Very handy.

Topbar Information Overload takes all of the numbers that are hidden away, and makes them fully available to use. Time/latency/FPS/Compass/Inventory space/coordinates/Friends & Cabalmates online/Black Bullion/Pax. On top of that, it also has small icons to open the settings menus of other mods that work with Topbar. It also doesn’t take up a ton of space, either.

If it’s one thing The Secret World does right, it’s making customizing how your character looks. There are hundreds of options from different coats to shoes to gloves to hats that all give your character the specific look you want, without having to sacrifice gear to get it. Serious to silly, all options are there. But, in-game, they’re not organized well. They’re just all placed in your Dressing Room screen by area of the body. Valet lets you create customized outfits the same way you use the in-game Gear Manager. As someone who changes their outfit pretty much every single time I log in, this is a necessary function.

It doesn’t take long to figure out that The Secret World crafting system is both easy and complex simultaneously. Combining aspects of Minecraft, you can use drops you find in game to create items that are useful to you. Want a hammer? Take a weapon kit and enough metal and make one. What I found was that I kept leaving the game to try to remember the patterns to make items, and leaving the game is inefficient. UltimateCrafter has all of the recipes built-in. All you do is tell it what you want to make, and if you have the materials, it’ll make it.

On top of that, disassembling items couldn’t be easier and quicker. The image shows my current settings. All loot that I get, all that green loot destined to be turned into their component materials, it breaks them apart, and stacks and upgrades the piles nicely in seconds. With the new augment system and the ridiculous amount of materials needed to progress in it, this mod is an absolute necessity.

So there you go, my Top 10 Mods that I use. That isn’t all of them, though. Here are other mods that I use that I just didn’t list. Check them out as well:

AcceptAllMeetUps – Accepts all Meet-Up Requests. Necessary during the last Halloween event.

13 responses to “The Modification of The Secret World: Top 10 The Secret World Mods #TSW”

While i find most of the mods you list very useful, the names of the authors you state are criminally wrong. Let’s see:

– Combat Statistics. Made by Aedani. I have no idea who JulianPaoloThiry would be, but i guess it’s somebody who uploaded it to curse without the authors permission.
– Mission Info and Ghost Tablet: i am not using them and don’t remember who wrote that, but i would expect the same “not the author, just an uploader” on the JulianPaoloThiry.
– Vipers Resource HUD, Vipers Nametag Overload, Vipers Topbar Information Overload. Apparently “created” by somebody called Ryiort?
Please, check out http://tswaddons.wordpress.com/ as Viper has created some more very useful addons to TSW, most of them i use.

For only two of your references i know that they are correct, for some others i don’t know the author, so i can’t tell. Those with wrong “author” clearly are uploaded without the authors permission. As the existance of Curse is not a secret, i consider it very likely that they have been uploaded against the original authors intention and without their permission.

I have published addons to other games, but not for TSW, due to TSW requiring flash and even there a very specific and expencive version, as code created with other flash compilers is incompatible to the game. But just like many other authors, i published my addons on the forums but never on Curse, as i disapprove of their methods. I won’t fight the “Curse is evil” battle here, but i would at least hope you give correct credit to the authors, instead of crediting their work to somebody who did no more than upload the addons to Curse. (The proper names can easily be found on the TSW forums. )

Next to all of that, i am astonished that Vipers Deck Manager and Vipers Castbar Relocator are not your #1 and #2. Of all addons to TSW, these two are what i consider most essential, followed by Eth’s Buff Bars. The first one allows me to handle decks much better than the in game tools, as it disconnects the deck from equipment. The other two allow me to display important information much better (no longer is important information locked to the corner of the screen, with these addons i can display it closer to the center, so i actually notice it on time) than the default user interface and make playing much more convenient.

Thank you for the info. I was not aware of a “Curse is evil” battle at all, as personally it seems to be the biggest outlet for acquiring the mods directly. Even if they were uploaded there without permission, it’s still a trustworthy platform for getting the mods out there. Downloading straight from a forum link sends up red flags to those of us who make it a priority to browse safely. I will update.

As for the Deck Manager and Castbar Relocator, I tried them, but I didn’t find them any more useful then what is currently in game. It added some stuff, but, in my opinion, they didn’t add enough to offset the uptick in memory usage. Buff Bars I tried, too, and I felt it added so much clutter to the screen. Useful clutter, sure, but still way too much.

Also, the Deck Manager allows you to save as many presets as you like, but the in-game Gear Manager has slots that you unlock using in-game currency. In this instance, the mod can be used to bypass the Gear Manager gold sink, and that can technically be considered a borderline “cheat”.

I’m not sure how I feel about Viper’s Deck Manager either, tbh. I don’t see the decoupling of equipment from the Deck presets as a plus, since I depend on that when changing roles. Not that the buggy built-in gear manager always does the job either. I saw no need for the Castbar Relocator; middle bottom works just fine for me, especially considering I am using hardware to activate my abilities rather than mouseclicks.

Thanks for the heads up on non-authors uploading to Curse, I was wondering about Ryiort as opposed to Viper. I was not aware of the “Curse is evil” battle either.

For that I just assumed Viper/Ryiort were the same person. It’s not uncommon, afterall, for one person to have multiple names, and using the one supplied by Curse, especially since it matched up, seemed right. The whole “Curse is evil” debate, though, might throw things off. Didn’t realize there was a secret war going on there, so I changed it to show no names. Seems the best option until I have the time to really research.

Hmm, oki. It could be that the crator of a addon uses another name on Curse. In this case, my reaction might be off. But i had the very same effect at some time. Some addons i created in WAR, even one which was unfinished and only handed out to my guild for testing ended up on Curse. (Being unfinished of course gave me addon a terrible reputation, too, which was not surprising, considering in which unfinished state it was. ) Of course “nobody did it”, it just materialized there out of thin air and annoyed me a lot. (After all, it was not me who uploaded it, so i obviously also was not the author and thus clearly had no right to remove it or replace it by a finished version. Fun… )

This in some way also is where my personal “Curse is evil” battle happened. I both hated that my unfinished mod was spread around. Next to that, i also dislike somebody making profit of my work without me granting him permission to do so. If a developer hands over his mod to Curse by himself, he makes the decission knowingly and willingly. But i disapprove of somebody else “doing that for him” without his permission. I guess any blogger is able to relate to that, just imagine somebody would sneak piles of advertisements into the transmission of your blog to make money of your “work”. Some people don’t mind, others dislike it, and i am one of the second kind.

On the point that it “feels like a cheat”, for me it clearly is not. I have a Grandmaster account and get more free points per month than i spend. I have bought all available item shop upgrades for inventory, bank, etc and still have plenty of points spare. For in game money, i am not sure if i maxed the slots, but their price is quite low compared what you pay for equipment repairs when you wipe in 10.4+ gear.

On terms of functionality, though, it’s way ahead. Unlike the games included deck manager, it is not plagued with bugs, but work reliable. And unlike the games own deck manager, it also already actually works with the augments, while the bugfix for augments in the game is announced but not implemented yet.

And on the advantage of gear and setup being separated, just one example: For the same dungeon, i switch between single target and multi target setups, depending on what i need. Depending on the party composition, mostly which form of healing the healer uses and how much cleansing is present, i modify how much of my gear holds health and how much is on attack rating.

With the games deck manager, i would have to either have like 6 configurations instead of 2, or i’d have to “fix” my gear every time i switch my deck. I consider that quite inconvenient, thus the separation of gear and deck is a big advantage to me. (Though, i wish Viper would finally also release his gear manager. Being able to quickly switch through several gear sets would make things even more comfortable. )

@Sylow I can see how how VDM would work well in the situation you describe, where you’re not switching roles often, just fights. Just as an example of one of my play sessions, on Monday night, I went from a “duo” build of Tank/Healer questing just with my bride to a more DPS oriented tankish (high-agg) build for running Scenarios with Ocho and the Knights of Mercy to full Blood-Fist Healing for a run through the Facility (with a brief DPS interlude for Contact Core). All of those required equipment swaps, not just ability swaps. Without gear swapping as well, Deck swapping is of limited value to me. I also have not really delved into augments since I am still devoting AP toward my Panoptic Core; therefore, therefore lack of augment support in the built-in doesn’t affect me. So while the built-in is buggy, VDM doesn’t really do what I need it to. (It also seems to be missing some intended features like grouping, but I wonder now if it’s because I got it through Curse.)

You’re right though; if Viper releases a Gear manager—especially if it’s well-integrated with the Deck manager—I’ll be all over it. I am less concerned about bypassing the Gearset limitations of the built-in, since VDM is available though the Funcom forums and they’ve had ample opportunity to at least state whether they consider it a cheat.

Regarding varying identities, there are several game-related forums where I am known as something other than Rowanblaze, because when I signed up for them, I had not yet settled on this nom-de-web. But it’s often not possible to change ID, nor worth creating a new one. As a fellow content creator, I’m sorry to hear about your troubles with Curse; though it seems whoever in your guild uploaded the unfinished mod (or someone else with whom a guildie shared it) is the person guilty of stealing your work. Curse’s unresponsiveness to your ownership claims on your mods is, indeed, unfortunate.

On the default gear manager or VDM, i guess it’s just too different playstyles. But i manage to switch between my prefered solo setup (ar plus fist) to my prefered dungeon heal setup (ar plus fist) by just replacing one talisman. On the other hand, when tanking in dungeons i use the same weapons (hammer plus blade) for almost all my tanking needs, but have extremely different gear for it. While many NM dungeons can be done with block/defense, Ankh NM for example wants all protection, as several of the bosses have specific (non-removeable) NM buffs which make them unblockable.

Or an even more “weird” thing: a commonly used healtank setup for facility NM is very similar to a solo build i sometimes use, albeit the gear necessary to use it properly in NM facility is completely different to what i use it with.

So i guess we’re just on quite opposite ends of the spectrum here, for me the skill-gear lock is terrible, for you it seems to be exactly what you want. Lucky us, thanks to the addons we have both options available.

And on the case of Curse: yea, of course the unknown uploader is the one who created all the trouble. I just am a bit more picky on “who is the author” of a mod as a result of that. I realized by postings in response to my first comment here, that i have come across rather harsh. I did not intend to do so, i guess i just got a bit burnt on the issue and thus react quite negatively on Curse.

Also, given the recent corrective action regarding a Scenario exploit (the reason we couldn’t group-run solo nightmares, Ocho) and lack thereof regarding VDM; I’d say that Funcom is OK with players using it it instead of the Gear Manager.

@Sylow: I don’t think you came across harsh. I think I was just surprised that I wasn’t seeing every side of the story. I had no idea there was such a seedy mod underbelly. Discussion is always good.

Yeah, the position that I believe Rowan and myself are coming from is one where, well, we haven’t really started raiding yet. Rowan’s defeated GK, so he’s all set. For myself, I still have yet to finish a few Elites. So, yeah, right now, our mod needs are different. But as you said, thanks to these mods, we all have options. Thus is the greatness of mods. :)

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Your description sounds like the crowd in The Horned God pub in TSW’s London. :P I do heavily suggest giving TSW a try. The characters and storyline, for an MMO, are top-notch and the BTP model they have is one of the best I’ve seen. The biggest complaints that most people have is about the combat and it being awkward, but I’m not sure where they are coming from. I enjoy the combat just fine. Now, it’s not perfect, it does have quite a few bugs, and there are systems that could be implemented better, but for all intents and purposes, it’s more than worth the price of admission.